Out of Florence and onto Siena was the order of the morning having studied the guides last night, both being medieval cities and one a walled town.
Arrived at Siena and the first difficulty was finding a car park but after a few circuits we finally found a vacant spot.
The next difficulty was finding our way through the wall into the town and after walking around a bit realised that the wall we were trying to find an entry for was into the Fortress not the city - it is San Gimignano that is a walled town (so much for last night's study!), but we have an excuse as we were distracted by a telephone call from home!!
In the middle of the town is the Piazza del Campo, a very impressive piazza which sits where the orginal roman forum once was and is reputed to be one of Europe's most famous medieval squares.
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| It ain't a city wall!! |
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| The grandstands |
Twice each year they have a festival known as the Palio which is centred around a horseback race, one horse representing each of the 17 contrades or districts - today they were setting up the piazza for the next festival which is on 16 August.
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| The colours of each contrade |
To get a really good feel of the festival and what it means to the locals you should do a YouTube search for "Palio Siena"
Near to the piazza sits the Duomo a stunning church of Romanesque - Gothic architecture built between 1136 & 1382.
Siena is also the setting for Romulus & Remus. According to legend, Siena was founded by Senius son of Remus, who was in turn the brother of Romulus, after whom Rome was named.
With it now getting into the afternoon we made the 50km trip to San Gimignano (yes this one had the wall) another medieval town this one with 13 towers only one of which you can climb.
So after paying for the privilege we took the many steps to the top of Torre Grossa which gave a fabulous view over San Gimignano and also the surrounding Tuscany area.
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| Torre Grossa |
Both of these towns are something special much like Todi which we visited earlier and one could have spent a full day in each.
On the way back to the car we stopped at a cafe for afternoon tea and sat beside an Italian family the father of which was an Australian from Sydney but one who has lived in Italy for 17 years - we had a very interesting chat with him and learnt even more about Italian life.
He hadn't heard the result of the Bledisloe so I had some pleasure in giving him the good news.
While in one of the shops we saw a dog much like Jessie in its own back pack - it certainly was a sight!
However a bigger shock was seeing that it had a nappy on!!
In Europe animals & dogs in particular are treated just like children even to the extent that they are taken into shops, restaurants and on public transport
The drive back to Florence ended a very enjoyable day
